Nail Baba Tea House

the kind of place that keeps coming up when you ask locals where they actually go. ticarethane sokak in fatih is a street that doesn't need to perform for tourists, and nail baba tea house fits that register. the address puts you in alemdar, close enough to sultanahmet to feel the pull of the old city but far enough that the crowd tends to be people with somewhere to be rather than nowhere to go. it's very strongly regarded by the people who return, which in istanbul's coffee scene means something, because the competition is genuinely fierce. if you're plotting a morning in fatih, ticarethane sk. no:14/a is worth building the walk around.